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On June 28, one of President Bush's key domestic priorities died with a whimper. During a second round of debate, the Senate voted 53-46 against cloture on the White House–sponsored immigration reform bill, meaning the legislation itself never came to a vote.

Whether the President was tacitly unsupportive or secretive and micromanaging—pundits accused him of both—one thing was clear: His handling of the legislative process and the wider debate had failed. So, too, had evangelicals'.

Rush Limbaugh commemorated the bill's demise as a victory for common Americans, who, presumably, recoiled at its lefty, amnesty leanings. Meanwhile, Cecilia Munoz of the National Council of La Raza said, "The results show the failure of the White House strategy of moving the bill to the right."

So which was it? Was the bill too bleeding-heart liberal for the average American? Or too punitive? Too naive? Or too security-minded?

In truth, political clichés shed little light on the issue—as the final Senate vote, which saw major defections on both sides of the aisle, indicated. Americans were and are split on immigration, and the divide doesn't fall along strict party lines. Evangelicals remain as splintered as the rest of the nation.

The day of the bill's defeat, Gary Bauer of American Values, echoing Limbaugh, released a statement claiming that "today's victory is proof that the will of the people can triumph over the Washington establishment." Well, perhaps not the will of all the people. According to an April poll by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, about 9 out of 10 U.S. Hispanics, who tend to be charismatics or conservative Catholics, support a path to legalization for undocumented immigrants.

Two months earlier, Richard Land of the Southern Baptists' Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission had called for reform similar to the failed legislation. He supported tighter border security, yes, but also a bill that would "allow the people of God to act 'redemptively,' reaching out to meet the physical, emotional, and spiritual needs of all immigrants as they work toward an earned pathway of 'legal status and/or citizenship.'"

When fellow conservatives like Land and Bauer disagree on an issue, you know it's hardly decided in evangelical circles.

As is often the case, our movement doesn't lack for conviction here, but it may lack for wisdom. Simply put: Evangelicals excel at the prophetic role we've chosen in politics, standing up for God's principles in a wayward world. We love black-and-white; we don't know what to do with gray.

The immigration debate won't be resolved by clarion calls for the rule of law—or by pleas for compassion. The Bible upholds both principles, and so must we. What's needed is discernment, even a little practical thought about solutions.

In a 1996 article for Christianity Today, Fuller Theological Seminary president Richard Mouw suggested that Christians develop an "ethic for the interim." Our nation and its citizens don't fall neatly into God's patterns of righteousness and goodness, he explained. "Some of us will want to think carefully about how our theology and spirituality can give healthy shape to our patterns of public witness." Translation: Mere sloganeering is never enough.

In addition, the Bible doesn't speak with equal clarity to every debate. As Chuck Colson said during a roundtable discussion with Ralph Reed and Tony Campolo, "[T]here are a lot of legitimate negotiable political issues that Ralph Reed, as a conservative Republican, and Tony Campolo, as a liberal Democrat, can be involved in." Christians may legitimately disagree on such things, he said, "but when you hang the Christian label on them, you divide the body of Christ."

Of course, some issues will appear less "negotiable" in hindsight. In the 1820s and 1830s, evangelicals like Jeremiah Evarts, secretary of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, opposed the government on the border crisis of the day: Native American removal from ancestral lands. Surely, we imagine, every follower of Christ would have condemned the policies that led to the Trail of Tears and other atrocities. Not at all. At the time, some Indians were attacking white settlers and stealing their livestock and produce in retaliation for encroachment. Many Americans viewed Indian removal as a security issue. Sound familiar?

Furthermore, some Christian leaders criticized those "who left their proper realm and sought to involve themselves in politics as 'canting fanatics,'" as Georgia Congressman Wilson Lumpkin put it.

In a CTeditorial entitled "Taking Politics out of the Sanctuary," pastor Ed Dobson urged "extreme caution" in taking political stands. Such warnings are worth heeding: We live in an over-politicized era. Yet most Christians will continue to see value in efforts to influence the public square for good.

So when we do engage politically, we must remember that moral outrage alone won't fix underachieving schools, rural decline, or a whole host of social ills, even abortion. To present a well-rounded vision for public policy, we must also employ the art of prudential judgment.

Immigration will come before Congress again, probably after the 2008 election. In the meantime, 12 million illegal immigrants continue to live and work in the country. The most God-honoring response to their presence won't merely be right, it will also be sensible. Now is the time to do the hard work of conceiving a policy that works.

For further reading on Christians and political engagement, check out the following articles:

"Conversations: The Politics of Patience"

"Matters of Opinion: Should We Give Up on Government"

"Colson: Why Women like Big Government"

"Letters: No Middle Ground"